THE GEORGE CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. 381 



All the implements, skewers, bull-heads, cords, and willow branches were deposited 

 inside the big canoe, and were considered sacred from that time out. I endeavored 

 to ascertain what all this meant, but could only get a meager account. The idea of 

 the big canoo is common among several tribes, and some infer that it is based 

 upon some tradition of the Deluge. The Mandans relate a story agreeing in many 

 respects with our account of the Flood. They say that their fathers came to this 

 country in a large canoe, and after having been many days on the water a bird 

 flew out to them, bearing a willow branch with fresh leaves on it. They soon after 

 landed, and drew the canoe on land to live in. The bird remained with them, and 

 showed them how to build earthen lodges and where to find game and fruit. This 

 bird is even now held sacred, and enters largely into their religious symbols. The 

 self-torture and mutilation which accompany their mysteries cannot be explained, 

 except by the supposition that it is a course of preparation for the hardships and dan- 

 gers of war. I noticed that every male over ten years old had the scars of the skewer- 

 holes on his breast and back. There are a few men who refuse or fail to undergo the 

 trial, and they are banished from all society with men. They wear women's dress, do 

 women's work, and can only be distinguished from the women by their coarser feat- 

 ures, and the contempt exhibited towards them. They are called by the traders hun- 

 dashers, a word of which I am unable to find the derivation. It is not Indian, and, so 

 far as I can ascertain, it is not French. 



Mr. Schoolcraft was dead at the date of the publication of this, aiid 

 Mr. Catlin in all probability never saw it. Captain Maynadier gives it 

 as something new, stating that " he believes these ceremonies have never 

 been described." 



Captain Maynadier witnessed the Mandan ceremonies twenty-eight 

 years after Mr. Catlin saw and described them, viz, in 1832, and at a time 

 when the Mandans had deteriorated, and were (as now) living in tribal 

 relations with the Gros Ventres (Minatarees). 



MR. JAMES KIPP'S LETTER OF AUGUST 12, 1872, CERTIFYING TO THE 

 CORRECTNESS OF MR. CATLIN'S ACCOUNT AND PAINTINGS OF THE 

 MANDAN RELIGIOUS CEREMONIES.* 



In the annual report of the Smithsonian Institution for 1872, Prof. 

 Joseph Henry, in relation to the accuracy of Mr. Catlin's account of the 

 Mandan ceremonies, writes : 



We publish the following letter as an act of justice to the memory of the late Mr. 

 Catlin, and as a verification of the truth of his account of a very interesting ceremony 

 among the Mandan Indians, a tribe now extinct. [Note.] The ceremony was es- 



*Captain James Kipp was bom of Frencli parents in Canada, near Montreal, March 15, 1788; died at 

 the residonco of his friend, Adam C. Woods, two miles from Barry, Clay County, Missouri, July 2, 

 1880, at the age of 92 years. He is hfiried beside bis wife, son, and daughter-in-law at Parkville, Clay 

 County, Missouri. 



Captain Kipp was one of the earliest pioneers of the northwest. He left Montreal in 1808, and be- 

 came a trapper and hunter amongst the Indians of the Ecd Eiver country. He was famous in the 

 early days as an Indian trailer. He passed to the Upper Missouri in 1818, traveling through (now) 

 Minnesota. He entered the service of the American Fur Company in 1819. In 1822 ho became the 

 agent of that company at Fort Clarke, Mandan village, Upper Missouri, where he remained until 1835, 

 a space of thirteen years. In June, 1832, Mr. Catlin found him there and became his griest. He was 

 probably, so the Mandans say, the first white man to learn and speak the Mandan language. 



Ho was a favorite with the Indians and was much respected by them ; a man of sis feet two inches 

 in height, erect, straight as an arrow, with blue eyes and brown hair. He left the service of the Ameri- 

 can Fur Company after 1834 and became an independent trader. Finding it necessary to have a base of 



